To ask neighbour not to use their 'tiny house'

[Notnowjo]

My neighbour has a huge house and a small additional dwelling in her back garden, we think it's used when family and friends come to stay. It's pretty small like a studio so couldn't really be lived in long term. It's not attached to the main house. She has 5 bedrooms, multiple bathrooms, 1 teenage boy so space isn't an issue

We discovered yesterday that all the dirty sewage & water from this studio has been draining across our property for the last 3-4 months.
It filters through a large garden (hers then ours) and our retaining wall then across our garden (gravity!)

It has taken her over 2 months to get a draining guy to look at it, it took him about 15 minutes to find the issue (yes we have been continually reminding her)

This morning I'm disappointed to see another stream of water across our patio, I think they shouldn't use the water in the studio until the problem is fixed.

Am I being unreasonable to ask her not to use the studio?

Can you get access and block up the pipe with cement if they are not willing to fix it?

Contact the council. I, also, knew someone who built a tiny house in their back garden. Cowboys must have built it as they collapsed next doors garden in the process. It turned out they hadn't had permission to build it in the first place, let alone get the council to check the build and sign off on it. Home owner excused this by saying her council tax would have gone up if she'd involved the council!

Urgh. No advice, lots of sympathy.

@Notnowjo can you say what country are you in? You’re not unreasonable at all but advice on the process of sorting this out is likely to be irrelevant unless we know where you are. There is bound to be someone here who can give country relevant input that will be more useful to you

This is definitely a public health hazard and needs to be reported to the public health department of your local council. It might be listed as Environmental Health, but in any case this is a huge risk for the spread of disease and they will take it seriously.

If it’s only been happening for the last few months then the most likely scenario is that there’s a blockage of some kind in the sewer leading away from the tiny house and any sewage is backing up and exploiting a manhole or large crack in the sewer to escape (into your garden). This blockage could be way down the line, so it would be worth getting in contact with your local water company who will clear the blockage if it’s in their part of the sewer (it becomes their part when two private sewers join, so could be on private land dependent on how the sewer system works). Send them lots of pics and let them know how distressed you are and the impact. The other option is to get a private sewer/drain unblocking company to have a look and clear it for you, but obviously this will be at a cost which you’d either have to pay or get your neighbour to agree too.

In the meantime, get onto environmental health.

Hi just checking back on this to see what you all think. Sorry if I’m being confusing we have a retaining wall, this has ‘drainage’ holes in it. Fluid is continually flowing slowly out of the drainage, some is seeping out of the bottom of the wall. This looks to be clean and doesn’t smell. Drainage guy said it was ‘dirty’ water, he would need to put a camera down the pipe to see where the hole/holes were. He said poop and paper would all have flowed out underground and be in the ground. It’s not a septic tank. I have no idea individually what her drainage plans are so whether the toilet flush joins close to the house or 1/2 way down the garden I guess we’ll know soon.
I’m not overly concerned about her studio, I have no reason to believe it shouldn’t be there or wasn’t plumbed properly it’s been there for years without trouble.The guy over the road who has a double garage and 3 off street parking spaces who not only chooses my house to park outside but if I go out will come over and move his car from down the street so it is outside my house bothers me far more (we have no off road parking)
I just wouldn’t personally use a toilet/sink/shower if I knew it was draining onto my neighbours garden and I had alternatives.
I will update you if I get any thing to add.

Back again 😁

it was more the yuk feeling when the drainage guy told us it was dirty water and we realised it has been coming out onto our garden for all this time.

then a couple of hours later me thinking it actually needed to be properly cleaned.

maybe the hole is really high and it’s just random occasional dishwasher water (she says hopefully) which is still yuk but a lot less so

I’m off to look at drainage plans now!

Politely ask her for the contact address of her insurers, because your own insurers have requested full details.

This had a galvanising effect on one of our neighbours.

Plenty of people in Australian country town are not on mains sewerage pipes but on personal sewerage tanks. These need emptying which may or may not be op’s problem.

This thread is so weird.
Lots of people kindly giving advice, which probably totally useless. Because the OP still hasn't said which country they live in.

I have my own reasons to not give my location, I didn’t think it was necessary to spell that out.

Have you never been in a situation where you do something you consider completely reasonable and the other person just ‘turns on you’ for want of a better word?
It happens to me all the time, so much that in those crazy 2am periods where you can’t sleep and are lying awake fretting about something I wonder if I am totally unreasonable and do in fact have Aspergers because of my inability to get a polite response from people

2 examples
someone backed into my car the other day, I got out and said hey you backed into my car.
No I didn’t he said (we were standing next to the cars which were still touching)
yes you did I said pointing to the cars.

what would you say?
i’d say
oh I’m so sorry I’ll move forwards and we can check everything is OK?
what did he say
well you shouldn’t be driving, (pointing to my kids L plates) not with those on the car I’ll report you.

that seems to be typical of every interaction I have with everyone ever!!

Anyway here’s another example.
during this time neighbour said it was our tree roots causing problems (she said she’d had trouble in the past and old owners refused to cut it down) so that weekend we cut the tree down.
I love trees but it’s obviously causing her problems and we all want to be good neighbours right?
wrong
we texted her yesterday afternoon, (drain guy isn’t sure which drain on her property it is coming from)
hey just letting you know that more water (note I said water not sewage don’t want to be confrontational) is coming across our garden today so if someone is still using the studio then it’s coming from that drain.
She waited 7 hours and texted my husband a mixed aggressive/defensive message at 1am. I’m still to read it (was at work) but really if you’re hosing sewage across your neighbours garden you’re hosing sewage across your neighbours garden, you need to deal with it and have to choose whether you are going to do it politely or in such a way that you never speak to each other again?

That’s why I asked the question

Hi I said earlier it’s not a septic tank I’ll be clear and say it’s not any sort of septic, special drainage situation.
We’re urban it’s drains.

@Notnowjo I was responding to Morestrangethings re not everyone being connected to mains sewerage.

If you are not in the UK, OP, you can't expect advice from here. Each country has its own system of dealing with issues like the one you raise.

Hi Sandgroper - good name, btw.

yes I was going to put in the sceptic tank bit - my aunt had a house with one - but I thought I’d read it wasn’t one earlier. I’m regional, but on tower water and sewerage thank heavens as most problems will be the council’s responsibility to sort out.

Well at least we all now how sewerage waste water works in most countries now. 😂 (not laughing at your problem OP - as I wrote earlier I’ve been there, but was able to get it fixed by council quickly).

I think you misunderstand mn, OP.
It's full of women who don't just pat your hand and say 'oh dear, how awful'. Go to Netmums if that's what what you want.
On MN posters roll up their sleeves and try and help.

Go to enviro health. You were more
Than reasonable to let her know and give her time to fix it and she clearly isn't bothered as it's not her garden covered in someone else's waste. I'd be really annoyed at the lack of responsibility on her end

Does the country you're in have an Environmental Health department?

It's pretty relevant as to whether or not you have any form of council/environmental health dept that you can contact as that would be first port of call in the UK

Report it to both the council and environmental health, she's being totally unreasonable to use it knowing of the issue!

Get into environmental health & planning right now.
If the water is toilet waste that is a biohazard, dangerous to health if not disposed of properly (think Cholera or dysentery outbreak dangerous) & neighbour will find themselves in so much trouble for not disposing if it properly to either a sewage system or septic tank.
I wouldn’t have taken this long to contact environmental health or planning but right now they need to stop using whatever is causing the dirty water to ingress onto your property immediately!

Please escalate to government agencies. She's shown you she doesn't give a shit because it doesn't affect her property, just yours.

I'd also take legal advice.

I'd be phoning your water company to see what they say about it, followed by the council's environmental health department.